When the Stars Align
by HikaruAdjani
Summary: Mona had spent her life just sliding along, guessing that everything she wanted was out of her reach. To gain her inheritance, and the home that she loved more than anything would require a 'sacrifice' she couldn't quite bring herself to make. And then, on top of her general ennui, a department trip to Ibiza, of all places. Few places could be less enticing to an ex-Hufflepuff
1. Chapter 1

(Ah, yes. The "Every fan fiction author has to write HP at least once!" challenge.)

Mona sighed, raising her hand against the bright sun and frowning. This was, as she'd been told ad nauseum, was supposed to be fun. Just like school was supposed to have been fun. She knew better, she had when she'd been a child faced with Hogwarts, and now, as an adult, faced with Ibiza. Everything here was wrong, the sun was too bright, there were too many people on the beach, it was too loud, too raucous, too...much.

"Holiday, my ass." She muttered, wishing that there was a place to hide, but there wasn't. She'd been a fool to try to convince herself that this was going to be different, a fool to have chosen to come to Ibiza with a bikini in her bags. A bikini. _This_ particular bikini... with ruffles and a cherry print. A silly purchase, truly. She'd love to go back to her hotel, to close the curtains, and try to find some way to wipe away the understanding of what she'd rather be doing. This week of all weeks, she had to be called here, to a muggle happy hunting ground of excess and silliness. She could be at home, with a telescope...waiting for the conjunction.

"You have _that _look, Mona."

Mona almost jumped out of her skin, her hand falling to her hip. There was no place to hide a wand in what she was wearing...or rather, not wearing, but she'd lived through a harsh time, and old habits died hard. She was a veteran of the Battle of Hogwarts, like so many members of her House. She'd been a sixth year, just barely old enough to make the decision to stay, but stay she had.

"Gloria."

"Pretty girl like you shouldn't be hiding, you should be down there trying to catch some eyes. It's Ibiza, Mona! Look at these men! Look at that one!"

Ah, yes. That one. He'd been trying to catch her gaze for the past quarter hour. The more she ignored him, the more of a challenge she was making herself out to be. She supposed he was quite lovely, as muggles went, but he was empty when her gaze fell on him again. No. Nothing. Zero. Zip. Zilch. "You want him, you go chase him." She told Gloria, and the older woman laughed at the very idea. Like Mona, she wore a bikini. But that was as far as the comparison could go, because Mona could get away with a teensy tiny little cherry printed bikini...and Gloria could not. The older woman breathed a certain level of boozy desperation that had grated on Mona's last nerve a long time ago.

"What happens in Ibiza, stays in Ibiza."

Somehow, Mona doubted that. She was, by her very nature, an extremely cautious soul, very good at talking herself out of things. And it had always served her well. "Better living through antibiotics?"

"Oh, oh, oh, ouch." Gloria whimpered falsely, "You are such a sour puss, Mona. Live a little. Let your hair down, you're only young once."

Actually, if Mona's mother was to be believed, Mona had been born old, and had seen nothing tempting enough to make her change. Not that Mona's mother seemed to find that too terribly comforting...

"Ah, well, if _you_ don't want him..." Gloria moved towards the water, and Mona only shrugged. She didn't, but there might be some amusement value in watching a fifty plus year old archaeologist with a fondness for crème puffs, packed into a black bikini, try.

It wasn't nearly as amusing as she'd been hoping, because the tanned young man seemed more than willing to go along with Gloria...back towards the hotel. The hotel with the room that Mona shared with Gloria. "Eeeewwwww." She muttered under her breath, suddenly grossed out. This trip just got worse and worse.


	2. Chapter 2

Of course, the moment that Mona realized she couldn't go back to the hotel room that she shared with Gloria, was the moment when it became too much to bear. She wanted, no, _needed_, some sanctuary. A quiet, calm, serene place to balm her nerves and put her back on the correct path again. But there was none of that here, only glaring beaches and so many people. Maybe if she just walked further away, she could find some respite from this horrible place. Even walking down the beach became an exercise in avoidance instead of a tranquil endeavor, dodging supine sun worshipers, balls, and the occasional man eager to catch her gaze. Insanity, just pure, pure insanity. Why would people scrimp and save to _deliberately_ come here? She missed the beach at home, it was nothing like this at all, but it had always worked its magic on her when the world seemed to have no more of it to spare. No sand, but rainbow shingles worn silken smooth, each one unique when she studied them. No crayon bright water, but a deep, solemn expanse of moody grays. Silence punctuated only by the drum of the surf and the plaintive call of gulls. There, Mona could hear _herself_ through the cacophony of life. Here, it was deafening, blinding.

She wanted to cry, she wanted to run. There had been a halfhearted plan to go see the less rambunctious sights, Sa Caleta... although she questioned the wisdom of going to see an archeological site during an archeology symposium... she'd be forced to see it again later, and there were too many people from work who'd just be soooo happy to see her there. But the main obstacle was simple, all she had was a pair of sunglasses, a rather skimpy bikini, and a room key. Her useful clothes, her sensible shoes, and her money were all in the hotel room. With Gloria. And her _friend_.

"Fuck my life." She muttered viciously under her breath. But there seemed to be some relief in sight... the beach was giving way to rougher ground, and there were actually human free patches of visible sand and rocks. It was a blessed relief to sit on a rock and focus on something easy to grasp like a tidal pool, a microcosm of the larger, empty sea. It was like a condensed novel, pared down to a small, easy to take in concept. Now, this was an Ibiza she could appreciate, rising cliffs and only a few stragglers giving each other wide berths. Kindred souls. And there was that man...

Mona's eyes narrowed behind the smoked lenses parked on her nose. Oddly, he was dressed, in linen pants and a whisper of a silk shirt, walking slowly up the beach in her general direction. His clothing would have been enough to make him stand out. But he seemed so strangely _familiar_. She'd met him somewhere before. He looked like...Lucius Malfoy. Only, younger. He had the same paler than blond hair, the same stance, he held himself exactly like...his father.

Draco Malfoy. Here. On Ibiza. Mona shrugged, flicking her fingertips in the pool next to her. Unlike so many, she held no truly deep vendettas against him. She'd been in the class below his. She'd been a Hufflepuff. He'd had more impressive targets, and quite bluntly, Mona's truest magical gift was the ability to be overlooked, to blend into the woodwork. It had served her all too well during the throes of insanity that Hogwarts, her mother's choice of school, had endured. Mona had kept her mouth shut and her head down. And it had worked. No sneaking around after hours for her. She just...blended. No Dumbledore's Army for her. No flag waving school adoration. Just survive to the next day. Hogwarts had been a hell she'd suffered through.

But Mona grasped evil. And she knew that evil, true darkness, had to be stood up to. That had come in her sixth year, and she'd done it the best she knew how. While others fought, she'd fought to help those who were braver, louder, more steadfast than she was. She'd picked them up, helped them to the infirmary, and used the spells she was best at to keep them alive. And those who weren't alive...

The simmering day grew cold and her lips narrowed. That was part of her disconnect with muggles now. She could tell any member of wizarding society that she had been a sixth year during the Battle, that she had worked in the infirmary, and on some level, they would get it. She couldn't exactly tell her flatmate, her coworkers, and any other normal person she dealt with on a daily basis that, at barely seventeen, Mona Fearon had been moving bodies. Dead classmates. Professors. Bloody smears on the flagstones...

Malfoy was closer, and she had the bizarre urge to go meet him. _He_ would understand it. He felt the weight of her eyes and raised his gaze to meet hers. Mona was suddenly, desperately aware of just how _stupid_ she looked. He looked pretty much like she'd expect him to look as an adult, expensively dressed, elegant in spite of walking the shore. And she was wearing a cherry bikini.

Worse, moving in her general direction had most certainly become moving in her precise direction. "Hello." He offered when he was close enough to be heard, and thoughts flurried through her brain. What in the hell was she supposed to call him? Draco was too familiar. Malfoy was...not familiar enough, and her mind laced it with the edge that so many of the man's Griffindor detractors had embittered it with. Mona had been less than impressed with a system custom designed to set students at each others' throats when she was younger, and was less willing to play that game now than ever before.

"Good morning..." Oh, what the hell. "Draco."

He stood completely up, his expression freezing and the motion of his hand making it obvious that his perfect linen pants had hiding places, unlike her teensy weensy bikini. Well, it didn't really matter...Draco Malfoy had his wand, but even if Mona happened to have hers, she'd always been a poor duelist. "Do I know you?" He demanded warily, and she shrugged, unsurprised.

"We went to school together." It sounded empty, and Mona could have kicked herself. Geographically, yes, but they'd been universes apart. "I was in the class below yours at Hogwarts." The breeze off of the ocean would kill her voice beyond his range, no reason to dance around it.

He tilted his head dubiously, shaking his head in denial. "Are you certain?" He finally asked, and Mona chuckled.

"I am."

"And you are...?"

"Mona Fearon." So many snide answers rose in Mona's mind, but she let them dissipate. Petty school games were behind her, and she took pity on his truthfully confused look. "I was in Hufflepuff."

And his eyes fell straight down, down to what that ruffled little bikini displayed so well. At least Mona had splurged on a professional wax on that insane buying trip that had brought this bikini into her possession. "You don't say." He answered drolly.

"I say." She grinned at him, standing, and brushing sand out of her ruffle. "I know. I wasn't very memorable."


End file.
